"We maximize it by playing together, loving each other, caring for each other. Kind of like the Care Bears. You know the Care Bears. They care for each other."

He was asked how he spent his offseason.

"I partied in July, hard. You gotta party. You can't just be a boring guy for 12 months, right? You gotta party hard in July. Eleven months out of the year we work out, and one month we go hard."

He was asked what he emphasized while preparing for the 2012-13 season.

"The most important thing for me to add to my game was nothing," he said.

Metta World Peace — unplugged, unedited, unglued. God bless him.

A confession: We love this guy, at least when he isn't attempting to part James Harden's beard with his elbow. As long as he's generally coloring inside the lines on the court, World Peace is our favorite Laker.

When he crosses one of those lines, however, we'll be the first to criticize the return of Ron Artest, the very essence of athletic evil in high-tops.

Now, understand this: As fractured and silly as some of his answers were, as space cadet as some of them sounded, World Peace actually practiced what he was going to say to the media when training camp opened this week.

He explained that he anticipated the questions, thought long and hard about them, and then sat down at his computer to craft various clever responses, hoping to sound prophetic and enlightened.

An example: A television reporter asked how the Lakers, with the additions of Dwight Howard and Steve Nash, would match up with Oklahoma City and Miami.

"I don't know how we match up with the Thunder and Miami," World Peace answered, "but I do know it's going to be hard for people to match up with us."

Ah, well put, Metta. Almost profound. Heads nodded in appreciation. More Confucius than how his responses usually sound — confusing.

World Peace, however, wasn't completely prepared. He forgot to anticipate the followup questions.

When the same reporter pressed him for reasons why the Lakers would be tough to match up with, he froze, suddenly becoming a 6-foot-7 Popsicle in purple.

"I wrote that quote yesterday, so I don't know why," World Peace confessed. "I totally wrote that quote, so ... All this stuff I'm saying right now I wrote down."

Admit it, he is entertaining. Then again, so is that water-skiing squirrel.

After being eliminated in the second round of the playoffs last season, World Peace decided that was the perfect time to publicly proclaim the Lakers the NBA's best team.

Last month, during a radio interview, he figured why not, so he suggested these new Lakers have a chance to go 73-9.

This week, he included himself along with Howard, Nash, Kobe Bryant and Pau Gasol, saying the Lakers "have five, basically, rock stars."

"It's an amazing group," World Peace went on. "Dwight's very entertaining. Steve Nash, you know, very entertaining. Pau's a great player, and they love him in Spain. And Kobe's Kobe. And Metta World Peace is Metta World. And, ah, when you put that group together, but these guys work hard. We all work hard. And then you put the whole team together ... you've got (Antawn) Jamison out there. He's one of the top five small forwards in the NBA. You got, ah, Jordan Hill, which is a fan favorite. People love him. Great team."

Ah, OK. So, Metta, what about that bench?

"This year we have a really deep team, especially with Jamison coming off the bench or even if he starts, whatever. Having those type of guys, amazing. Jordan Hill, that's a deep bench. Steve Blake, Goolock ... I don't know how to pronounce his name ... Gowlock? We got a deep bench."

For the record, that would be Andrew Goudelock, pronounced GOWD-lock.

Also, for the record, if Jamison ever was one of the league's top five small forwards, it was 10 years ago.

But, hey, World Peace is just happy, just excited. And why not? The Lakers have been rebuilt from the center out and, based on appearances, again are NBA title contenders.

"We're great on paper, but paper cuts hurt," World Peace observed. "I wrote that one, too."

They share the same goal, these Lakers do, as certainly as they share the same planet. It's just that one of them, thankfully, lives in a different World.

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